Lamenting Samurai
by Cybertronprincess
Summary: With unrelenting relief, however, he reached out and saved himself, as I had so hoped his father would. Mifune POV. Onesided Mifune/White Star. R&R.


A long time ago, I knew a very passionate man. He was hard working, determined, strong, and along with all this, he was loving. He looked after his family, protected his mother from bandits, supported his father as he got older. White Star was... well, he was my friend, as children. Our clans associated frequently; samurai and assassins clashed regularly, you see. However, our clans tended to work together. They'd fought numerous times, but turned to each other when one required the others' skills.

While the adults conversed and made deals, they sent the children out to play.

I was a lone wolf when I was young, still am today, I suppose. I preferred to be left to my own device, being used to it as I was an only child. But when my cousins and I were left with the Star children, one boy always came up to me.

"Hey!" He'd crow in a rough, yet cheerful voice. "Wanna play with me?"

My cousins would whisper and mumble to each other, "He's asking Mifune?" They'd say. "Who wants to play with _Mifune?_"

Needless to say, I didn't get on very well with my cousins. But White Star didn't seem to care; whenever he saw me sitting on my own, he'd abandon what ever game he was playing with the others and come up to me with that big, goofy grin.

"What's your name?" he asked, bending at his waist, hands on his knees. I looked up at him from my place on the grass, observing him silently and blankly.

"What's yours?"

"I'm White Star!" he replied without hesitation, standing up straight and jabbing a thumb into his own chest proudly, flipping his snow white fringe back. "I'm the heir to the head of the Star clan! You?"

"... Mifune." his forest green eyes blinked, expecting more of an introduction. I gave him none. Not even pushing for one openly, he offered me his hand and that grin grew wider somehow.

"Come play with me, Mifune!"

He was... nice. I didn't really get along with anyone my own age, always those younger than me. As it is now, I suppose. White Star was ten when we first met, and I was twelve. Every time we saw each other, he had that big, goofy grin.

As we grew older, entered our teens, perfected our abilities, our families still affiliated with each other. We were still being sent off while the adults talked, and he'd still come up to me with that stupid grin. He didn't ask me to play anymore, though he said we could if I wanted to. He just sat down in front of me, crossed legged.

"You always sit in the same place!"

"You always come up to bother me."

"You're always on your lonesome," he rested his cheek upon his fist, elbow on his knee. "Being alone all the time isn't fun, not matter what you say, Mifune-kun."

He tended to talk that way most of the time. Actually, when he started talking, no one could shut him up. We would sit there on the grass beneath the cherry blossom tree by the Koi pond, and he would talk endlessly about this and that, always revolving around the topic of himself or his training.

When I was nineteen, our clans collaborated once again. I sat there under the tree, actually _waiting_ for that idiot to come up to me with his big grin and start talking blindly to me. I always listened to his babble, though, I was a very patient person. As expected, he came running up to me, big smile on his face.

Not so expectedly, he had a girl with him.

"Mifune-kun!" he yelled. I turned, eyes widening to see him holding hands with a beautiful girl. Her eyes were as blue and clear as a storming ocean, her hair long and a pale blue, reaching passed the bottom of her pink kimono with red flowers printed on the bottom and sides. Slender legs were bare, dainty feet housed in red sandals, skin pale as the moon and as smooth looking as freshly fallen snow. Her slim hands were clasped around just one of White Star's strong, tanned hands, pressing herself and her perky breasts up against his side, peering over his shoulder shyly. "This is Amaya-chan, she and I are gonna get married!" he grinned.

Married. I had never thought about marriage until White Star had spoke of it in that brief, fleeting moment. Saying he was going to marry this beautiful woman. It was arranged by their parents; she was from a separate clan who wanted to marry off their youngest daughter for financial reasons. They hadn't liked the idea at first, but, as White Star put it, "I took one look at her and did a back flip out of excitement!"

"Literally!" Amaya giggled, pressing her face against his shoulder. I had to fight back a disgusted twitch, keeping my sword in its sheath.

"I am happy for you." I said. Amaya had frowned worriedly, like she was offended by my lack of words.

"Don't worry; Mifune-kun is always grumpy!" White Star had laughed. Yes, he knew me very well. We'd fought side-by-side, eaten lunch together, trained together. We knew everything about each other; he was my best friend.

And he was getting married to this beautiful, delicate flower.

I don't know when my anger and realisation flared, perhaps it was when they shared their first kiss there under the blooming cherry blossom tree, myself as the soul witness, or when White Star had clapped me on the shoulder and said, "You'll be my best man, won't you?" Or after I'd accepted, and they'd run off, hand in hand. Whenever it hit me, it flared so brightly within my soul I sliced through the trunk of the tree, letting it topple over into the Koi pond.

I got in trouble for that later.

He was my best friend; I knew everything about him. His favourite food was roast pork, his favourite band was Metallica, he loved sweet food but hated anything spicy, and he had three scars across his back from where he'd defended me on the battle field once. My best friend was getting married, and his betrothed was a gorgeous, dainty little angel.

I bet she hadn't fought a day in her life. I bet she was dumb as a brick wall. I bet she would never be able to cook enough for White Star's insatiable appetite. She wasn't worthy of someone as strong and passionate as White Star, she was pathetic in comparison. Sure, she was beautiful to the point of being Goddess like, her voice was angelic and made the heart melt and her eyes had a deep, meaningful shimmer to them, but she still didn't deserve my best friend as a husband. She wouldn't satisfy him, she wasn't worthy, the only one who _was_ deserving of White Star was... was...

Oh Kami, I'd fallen in love with my best friend.

It wasn't men; I didn't see any man the same way I saw White Star. It was just him, only him. Somewhere along the line I'd fallen for him, and the moment I'd realised was the moment he told me he was getting married.

How horribly cliché.

The wedding arrived. As promised, I was his best man. As he reached for the ring, I felt the urge to grab it and toss it away, proclaim my love for him and beg him to marry me instead. But I didn't; I just handed him the golden band and watched him slip it onto Amaya's finger. I watched the ceremony, I listened to their vows, pathetically closing my eyes and pretending he was talking to me.

"With this hand; I will lift your sorrows.

Your cup will never empty, for I will be your wine.

With this candle, I will light your way in darkness.

With this ring, I ask you to be mine."

I watched them share their first kiss as man and wife.

A few years prior, I had taken a liking to meditation. White Star didn't like it, he hated sitting still for long periods of time. Around two months after the wedding, I had been sitting on a cliff edge, facing a waterfall, meditating with my katana in my lap, when, "Mifune-kun!"

I jumped up, facing White Star who was panting and huffing, having clearly _run_ all the way up the side of the cliff from his home with Amaya, on the other end of the valley.

"Is something wrong?" I asked. He shook his head, catching his breath. When he finally looked up at me, he had tears in his eyes and the biggest, stupidest grin I had _ever_ seen on his face in my entire life.

"It's Amaya," he panted, choking on his words. "She's pregnant!"

Black Star was the tiniest child I had ever seen. Wrapped up in black blankets, being held in White Star's muscular, broad arms, he looked to be the size of a kitten. He had his father's eyes and his mother's hair, though the only cluster on his head was a little tuft of pale blue poking out over his forehead. White Star had cuddled and coddled him, whispering and humming lullabies to his new born son. He'd then looked up at me with the gentlest smile.

"Wanna hold him?" he asked. "You love kids, after all." I carefully took Black Star into my arms. He stared at me inquisitively as I cooed at him quietly, softly bouncing and jostling him around, cradling him here and there. "I wanted to ask you something." White Star said. I looked up; he'd moved to the side of the bed, holding Amaya's hand as she smiled at me tiredly. "Mifune-kun, will you be Black Star's Godfather?"

I'd seen him lying in the field with his baby, watching the clouds and talking to his son. He knew I wasn't far away, he knew I had his back.

"You wait and see, Black Star," he grinned, lifting the baby above him at arms length, making the child laugh and scream happily. "Daddy will get big and strong; I'll protect you and mummy from nasty bad guys. I'll make you proud, my son."

I thought to jump down and tell him he was already strong, that Black Star would never be more proud of his father than he was then. But I would just ruin the moment. I didn't want to do that.

Blood stained the wooden floors, souls hovering above the corpses of the innocent. Looking over them, I couldn't possibly hope to believe the man who had done this was my beloved friend. But there he stood; the glorious White Star, his usual happy, God like glow – the glow I would have died for – replaced with demonic shadows and hard eyes. He glared at me, told me he simply wanted to win. He shattered my heart once again, and I seethed at the horrendous cliché this had all turned out to be.

He loved his son, he loved his wife, I knew this better than anyone. Because I was part of their family, Amaya had once told me, a hand on my arm as we watched White Star play with their son, who was taking his first steps at such an early age.

"Never doubt how much we care for you, Mifune-niisan. You will _always_ be in our hearts."

What could have possibly stung more; being told their family loved me by the wife of the man I adored, or knowing that in trying to become stronger for that family, he'd carved apart his soul and humanity, replacing them with power.

Or maybe it was having my blade slice through my beloved's stomach, letting him fall to the waterfall and the rock below.

I'd found Amaya's body among the burning ruins of the Star clan's village. Her beautiful body was beaten and torn horribly; completely mutilated. She was holding one of White Star's kunai knives.

She'd _fought _to defend her baby. She'd _died_ protecting him.

I searched through the wreckage for days, but couldn't even find any trace of Black Star.

Years later, after meeting the little witch Angela, a rambunctious little boy with spiky, pale blue hair and a star tattoo on his shoulder came barging into our home, waving around a weapon girl with several different modes.

If it is fate, the very word hates me. Black Star had grown, sprouted and bloomed, like the flowers on the cherry blossom I'd met his father beneath. He was hard working, determined, strong, and along with all this, he was loving.

He defeated me, and I did not _let_ him. He left us be, by _choice_.

I thought he had potential; thought he'd be everything my White Star had thrown away. We met several times in battle; but the final battle was most important.

I thought I'd lost him. I thought perhaps it was me; did being exposed to me cause others to stray from the good path? Would that happen to Angela?

With unrelenting relief, however, he reached out and saved himself, as I had so hoped his father would.

Black Star had fallen in love with his weapon; the beautiful, angelic Tsubaki Nakatsukasa. I didn't mind as much as I did when White Star fell in love with Amaya, but as his Godfather; I kept an eye on them.

It's what White Star and Amaya had wanted.


End file.
